eBooks

Can you be gluten intolerant without having celiac disease? Can gluten cause symptoms not related to digestion? A growing body of evidence proves that non-celiac gluten sensitivity (NCGS) is not only real, but possibly a larger problem than celiac disease.

An estimated 20 million Americans have thyroid disorders, but more than half don’t know it. Find out why thyroid problems are so often mis-diagnosed, what really causes them, and how to heal them naturally.

Research suggests that healing your gut may be the single most important thing you can do to improve your health. In this eBook, you’ll learn how to optimize your gut health—and by extension, your overall health—with simple diet and lifestyle changes.

What is a low carb diet, really? When can a low carb diet be beneficial? Should everyone follow a low carb diet? Or, can a low carb diet ruin your health? After reading this eBook, you’ll be able to understand the many factors that play into how a person handles a low carbohydrate diet, and whether or not their health will improve on such a plan.

Are common additives to food and supplements like soy lecithin, carrageenan, xanthum gum, and magnesium stearate harmful–or harmless? Read this eBook to find out which ingredients you should be concerned about, and which are safe.

Is sugar “toxic” in any amount—even in natural sweeteners? Are artificial sweeteners safe? What about stevia and xylitol? Cut through the confusion and hype and find out which sweeteners are safe for you and your family.

The Paleo diet has the potential to dramatically improve your health—but the transition doesn’t always go smoothly. In this eBook, you’ll learn the three biggest obstacles to Paleo success, and how to overcome them.

What do memory loss, depression, anxiety, fatigue, nerve pain, and infertility have in common? They can all be caused by B12 deficiency. Find out why B12 deficiency is more common than most doctors think, how to know if you’re deficient, and what to do about it.

Does eating cholesterol and saturated fat really cause heart disease? Are statin drugs as effective as we’re told? Find out what the latest research says in this eBook, and learn how to prevent and treat heart disease naturally.

Sure, the classic kings of the industry still remain. Taco Bell continues to churn out ever-more ridiculous-sounding bastardizations of Mexican food. McDonald’s reign is on the decline, but the golden arch empire puts the Mongols’ empire at its height to shame. And you can always go to Wendy’s for your square burger fix. C’mon, though: if you’re relying on the likes of Taco Bell or KFC for your caloric intake, you’ve already given up on life.

But when a person can walk into Chipotle and get a tub of presumably-cruelty-free meat, guacamole, lettuce, and grilled vegetables for under $10, haven’t we reached the promised land of healthy, affordable eating? The vegans can have their quinoa and the paleos can have their carnitas. Everyone’s happy.

Except real students of nutrition and healthy eating know that much of what passes for healthy fast-casual food can still be improved upon. What we have, while better, simply isn’t good enough.

You can often sub out fries for grilled veggies, but they’re invariably doused in vegetable oil.

Salad options exist, but they pour a quarter cup of sugar-sweetened, seed oil-based dressing on them.

As I see it, these guys are simply rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic. An iceberg made of nutritional awareness, partially forged by folks in the ancestral health movement, threatens to wreck their livelihood. They can either continue toward disaster or change course. They’re trying to change course, but it’s slow going, they’re manning massive ships, they’re operating on bad information, and they still have millions of customers who expect things done a certain way — the old way.

Things are changing, and several growing trends give me hope. The food truck craze sweeping the nation has kickstarted an exciting new medium for food. Legions of mobile restaurants helmed by exciting, innovative chefs with vision, agility, and low overhead are changing the scope of food in this country, bringing incredible food at lower prices and higher quality. There are even full-on paleo/Primal food trucks.

The farm-to-table movement is bigger than ever (well, in this century, at least). Grass-fed beef, local poultry, and wild-caught seafood are no longer rare menu items, but calling cards and outright staples for an increasing number of new restaurants.

Even Chipotle finally ditched the soybean oil with which they laced everything on the menu, switching instead to rice bran oil. Hey, it ain’t EVOO or lard, and it was more about eliminating GMOs than high omega-6 seed oils, but it’s a step in the right direction.

Still, not everyone has access to food trucks and hip eateries with close ties to local farmers. And Google’s autofill has a disconcerting tendency to associate “Chipotle” with “causes diarrhea.”

There have got to be better, more democratic ways to get good food quickly.

Some suggest we should learn to make do with what’s available at existing restaurants. It’s possible, sure. With my travel schedule, I’m always zipping around the country and going abroad. Since I can’t just eat anything if I want to be at my best, I’ve become a pro at divining the healthiest, most nutrient-dense fare in the saddest of chain restaurants. I know which places will usually “cook my eggs in butter” or “have real olive oil in the oil and vinegar spouts.”

That’s me, though. I basically do this stuff for a living. Scanning a menu and figuring out what’s good is like breathing at this point. Most people aren’t going to take the time to pick through the meager offerings to find something worth using to fuel their mitochondria.

If you can:

Imagine a world where you don’t have to wonder what exactly goes into the special sauce.

Imagine where you can rest assured that the cooks aren’t dropping frozen hunks of potato into vats of rancid vegetable oil that hasn’t been changed in a week.

Think of a restaurant where you can walk in and order anything with supreme confidence that it’s going to taste good and be good for you. A restaurant without questionable ingredients or protocols, where you can finally “just order” without a laundry list of substitutions.

Sounds pretty great, right? So why hasn’t such a restaurant gotten off the ground, or gained widespread acceptance?

Let’s face it: we’re still a vocal minority. We who care about what our meat ate. We who seek the provenance of a cooking oil. We who are willing to read blogs and buy cookbooks and spend money and time on good food. Most people simply aren’t prepared to give a damn about what they’re eating as long as it tastes good. And that’s totally expected. The desire for good tasting food is innate in all animals. Good food is, well, good.

That’s also why obesity continues to progress, with over 28% of Americans reporting being clinically obese. Before the naysayers arrive: yes, they use BMI to quantify the obesity rates and yes, on an individual basis BMI can misdiagnose the muscle-bound as obese or overweight, but at the population level BMI is fairly accurate. And while diabetes rates in the US are slowing, they’re not dropping and they’re still rising, just at a lower rate.

I’m no pessimist. In many respects, people are getting healthier. McDonald’s, as I alluded to earlier, has taken some serious financial hits. They realize that people are realizing their food is slowly killing them. Coca-Cola is getting desperate enough to fund researchers to promote the idea that it’s physical inactivity, not the sugar water people pump into their bodies, that’s making Americans fat. People are drinking less and less soda each year. Fast food is in decline. People are ready for something different, something better.

Given our collective desire for delicious food, healthy food can’t be health food. You don’t call it health food, because that conjures horrifying imagery of cardboard veggie burgers and non-fat sour cream (how do they even make that stuff?). It has to taste great before anything else. And that’s the cool thing about the prospect of healthy Primal-friendly fast-food. It would taste damn good. It’s great food that happens to be full of micronutrients, healthy fats, protein, and absent refined grains, sugar, and processed seed oils that are the hallmark of what most people consider to be tasty fast food.

Five years ago, this wouldn’t have been possible, but I recently announced the start of something very cool and very new in the fast food arena: Primal Kitchen Restaurant franchising. All those perfect restaurant fantasies mentioned above? That’s the precise basis for the franchising system we’ve devised. I’m pleased and honored to be a part of the growing trend toward better-tasting and healthier fast food, and I’m excited to see where it goes.

One thing is certain, though.

We’ll win this one, guys. People care too much about what they eat–and how they feel–for us not to.

If you’d like to learn more about opening your own Primal Kitchen franchise restaurant, contact us here and we’ll be in touch shortly.

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Nowadays, people agree when they hear the words fast food & nutrition in the same sentence. This is because restaurant owners responded to the food preference of the people. More and more people are paying attention to the nutritional value of the food they want to eat even on a fast food restaurant. People are watching their weight and so they really make a conscious effort to take care of it.

Fast Food companies just try and get away with calling a few options healthy and hope that they get customers who don’t actually do their research. They are hoping to reach that target market of “looking to get healthy”. As a personal trainer, I encounter this kind of person a lot – they think they should get healthy so they order salads with fried chicken soaked in ranch. Those who actually want to eat healthy should know the difference between “healthy” fast food and real healthy foods.

This all sounds like the way most people that read these type of articles (myself included) would want to eat out. My wife and I just want a break sometimes from so much food prep at home trying to eat “real food” but find it very hard to source a restaurant that we trust. I think the potential customer base is limited like Mark states and true “healthy eaters” are the minority. Like any business if you can keep the overhead to a minimum there is a potential to make something fly like this. Anyone from the Hershey, Pa area that wants to get together and brainstorm about putting something together, feel free to contact me.

If you come to London, look for Pret a Manger for a light meal to eat in or take-away. I always find something that is wheat free; they’re very good at telling customers what the ingredients are and everything is very fresh.

I couldn’t find anything I could eat at Pret a Manger when I was in London. Even the lettuce wrap had a flour tortilla inside. And when it seemed as if it was without bread, or similar wheaty things, then it had soy sauce. But more than that, how could I even tell how serious they were about keeping something gluten-free truly free from all cross-contamination as well in the prep area (and what I have seen of prep areas it’s a wonder we are not all dead…).

Interesting idea! Just today I was wishing there was a chain of paleo food stores that carry only “real food”. A new “health” food store opened in my town so I checked it out. A modest organic produce section and aisles and aisles of packaged foods and vitamins. I could have purchased all the meat they had and put it in my fridge at home! Clearly they think healthy = vegetarian whether it’s processed or not. Very disappointing. If this restaurant idea flies maybe a chain of paleo supermarkets could be next.

A darn-good option newly available at Carl’s Jr / Hardee’s: two varieties of their All Natural burger. They’re made with 100% grass-fed beef and all-natural cheese. I get mine sans bun (lettuce wrap) and sans sauces (add guacamole). It’s not as good as homemade, but not shabby for under $7! These burgers have become a travel staple for my family.

The Carl’s Jr. all-natural burger lettuce wrap plain with onion only (I’m AIP) is my go-to for most days to get my protein in (add to it some organic veggies from the grocery store). I’ve been wanting to do a quick-serve auto-immune friendly real food drive-through restaurant for years now, but not marketed as that – just silently not having common allergens on the menu. It’s such a pain not only with the proliferation of SYSCO oils and gluten but also tomatoes and spices. I was having Mongolian BBQ last night (my other dine-out option), but the griddle had just cooked someone’s spicy order, and I was picking chili skins and nightshade seeds out of my meal all evening. Anyone interested in helping me get it off the ground?